Dumitru (Fiscal Council): we live with the illusion that we have a qualified work force

The idea that Romania has a qualified workforce has become an illusion, as the human resource is more and more unqualified,which is noticed in the quality of the students, and on the other hand it has become more expensive, stated the chairman of the Fiscal Council Ionut Dumitru.

He states that one of the problems the entrepreneurs are facing ever more often is connected to the workforce.

‘Qualified workforce – we live with the illusion that we have a very well qualified work force – it is only an illusion. I am telling you that as a professor – I see the quality of the students every year, it is going down. It is a certainty ‘ stated Dumitru in a Digi24 show.

He added that the competitive advantage to have qualified workforce ‘ is no longer valid’.

‘More than that, not only it is no longer well qualified, but it is more expensive’ says the chairman of the Fiscal Council.

Dumitru drew the attention that in some economic areas there is a major deficit of workforce in such domains as IT, but the employers need welders or tractor drivers whom they do not have.

‘We had discussions with many entrepreneurs in the last two-three years. They said ‘ we don’t need people with two faculties, we need welders, we need technicians, we need turners. We don’t find them’ said the chairman of the Fiscal Council.

In almost all specialties, the level of training is lower and lower.

The big issue of the workforce, besidesthe fact that is less and less, out of different reasons, such as the demographic factor, migration as well as the tendency of the pupils and students, is the quality of the human resource, which is weaker and weaker.

Asked why the companies in Romania close down, taking into consideration that last year there went out of the market 160,000 companies and only 75,000 companies were registered. Dumitru says that there are multiple explanations.

‘The fact that companies get in and out of the economy is a normal phenomenon. Anywhere in the world you have in and out, you have a business plan if it is validated by reality, survive,but if you have high expectations or you make mistakes, clearly you fail. I think that if we have a look at the last years, things have improved from this perspective as well’ he added.

The economist said that Romania’ s image at this moment is still good, but not very good, it is deteriorating.

‘If we have a look at the macroeconomic data that we have, Romania has never had in the last 27 years better economic figures than in the last years, 2015 – 2016, not only economic growth, but macro balance as well. But the direction we took is not good’, Dumitru said.

From the point of view of the investors, they feel that it was and it still is a moment when they can invest, benefit from a growth of demanad and they can put to practice their expansion plans.

‘But obviously nobody can see horizons of one year. The moment you invest you have a several years horizon, and the moment you notice the things go bad, you start go back’ Dumitru said.